New York, on a Sunday

Today I visited the Rockefeller Center, which is in midtown Manhattan, and was built by John D. Rockefeller in the late 1920s.  At the time it was built, I'm led to believe it was the largest privately-owned real estate development in the world.  Fans of 30 Rock will be familiar with the building; in real life, NBC Studios are still a major tenant.  This is the bit of wall from which the show takes its name, and which appears in the opening credits.

And here's a vertical shot to give you some idea of the dizzying scale of the building:

You can also do tours of the NBC Studios, which I did.  No photography allowed on the tour, so here's a shot of the outside.

The highlights of the tour included the set of the Late Show with Jimmy Fallon, and for me, I was excited to see they were displaying the Grammy Award that was won by the Roots, Fallon's house band.  We also got to see the set of Saturday Night Live, which was surprisingly not that big.

Down the road is Radio City Music Hall, which is an impressive, 1920s era theatre.  Here's the inside, and outside, pictures.

The acoustics are amazing.  This was taken from the third mezzanine, basically the furthest seats from the stage, and down on the stage is another tour group.  They were a travelling choir from somewhere, so they bunched up on the stage and sang 'Oklahoma' (perhaps that's where they were from, or maybe they just like the song lol).  No kidding, I could hear everything perfectly without microphones.  The tour also included a look at the Guest Book, which has been signed by a lot of the artists that the Music Hall has hosted.  Among others, you might be able to pick out Alfred Hitchcock, Al Gore, Paul Simon, Mariah Carey, Cyndi Lauper, Sheryl Crow, John Legend, Chaka Khan, Liberace (the flamboyant signature with piano sketch in the bottom right corner), Neil Sedaka, and, er, Hilary Duff.

Also, here's something really kitsch - me with a Radio City Rockette.  'Twas kind of hilarious to pose for :)

And because we all love food porn, here's some of the pizza I had for lunch :)